Barcelona Libraries
As an essential way of providing citizens with free access to world culture, Barcelona has a wide network of libraries that house information and encourage reading through a wide range of activities aimed at all audiences. The Consortium of Libraries of Barcelona is formed by the Barcelona City Council and Barcelona Provincial Council and has 40 facilities.
Please check them all at Biblioteques de Barcelona

Every year, Biblioteques de Barcelona organises the “Parlem amb…” programme, which consists of meetings with authors and people related to literature. A great many international authors have visited Barcelona to share their knowledge and experience.
2007: Julian Barnes / Samina Ali / Ricardo Piglia
2009: Siri Hustvedt / Haruki Murakami / Hanif Kureishi / Salman Rushdie / A. Lobo Antunes / Lidsay Davis / Martin Amis / Isabel Fonseca / Amin Maalouf
2010: James Ellroy / Ivan Klima / Gioconda Belli / Siri Hustvedt / Umberto Eco
2011: Sergio Ramírez
2012: Erri de Luca / Christopher Paolini / Ismael Kadaré / Alessandro Baricco
2013: John Irving / Ian McEwan /David Safier
2014: Amy Tan / Jo Nesbo
2015: William Boyd / Richard Ford
2016: Yasmina Khadra / Bernhard Schlink / Peter Stamm / Alessandro Baricco
2017: Jean-Claude Carrière / Roberto Saviano / Jean Echenoz / Sophie Divry


The Club de Lectura Internacional Barcelona – Medellín is a meeting point and a place of cultural exchange that, once a month, unites readers from Barcelona and Medellín (Colombia) by videoconference to discuss and read works by Colombian and Catalan authors. This reading club, which takes place at the Biblioteca Ignasi Iglésias-Can Fabra in Sant Andreu district, is a project organised by Biblioteques de Barcelona with the collaboration of Casa América and Alcaldía de Medellín.
Known since 1994 as the IMPAC Dublin Literary Award and renamed in 2015 as the International Dublin Literary Award, this award is granted every year to a work written in English or translated into English. The first phase of the process in selecting the winning work involves the readers of the public library systems around the world. Biblioteca Vila de Gràcia in Barcelona forms part of this network and its librarians and readers select 3 titles to be nominated for the award.
In 2016, the Barcelona UNESCO City of Literature Office was able to propose a member of the jury. The person appointed was the poet and university professor Jaume Subirana.

Biblioteques de Barcelona offers a large number of children’s activities aimed at both kids and their parents. Under the name of Lletra Petita, these activities are included in the following blocks: “Aperitus musicals” (educational auditions), “El racó dels pares” (advice on books for children), “Llibres a escena” (small format and short works), “Sac de rondalles” (storytelling), “Club de lectura infantil i juvenil” (space for sharing reading) and “Tallers de descoberta” (knowledge awareness workshops).


The Xavier Benguerel Library houses the Child and Juvenile Literary Documentation Department. In order to preserve, study and disseminate all areas relating to child and juvenile literature, the department focuses especially on Catalan works and authors. It is aimed at both professionals of child and juvenile books and parents, teachers and people interested in child and juvenile literature in general.
Biblioteca Xavier Benguerel - Servei de Documentació de Literatura Infantil i Juvenil
